Bulahdelah Bypass – Bulahdelah Upgrade – The Roads & Maritime Services (RMS, RTA) Pacific Highway 'upgrade', Bulahdelah section, is NOT a Bypass! It is NOT an upgrade! It is Extremely Dangerous!

• Prolonged or excessive exposure to noise, whether in the community or at work, can cause permanent medical conditions, such as hypertension and ischaemic heart disease. (ref. [World Health Organization – WHO] Guidelines p.XII)

• Noise can adversely affect performance, for example in reading, attentiveness, problem solving and memory. Deficits in performance can lead to accidents. (ref. [WHO] Guidelines p.XII)

… Some 20 years after its last publication on noise, WHO has issued Guidelines for Community Noise. This publication, the outcome of a WHO expert task force meeting in London in March 1999, includes guideline values for community noise (listing also critical health effects ranging from annoyance to hearing impairment), for example: (ref. [WHO] Guidelines p. XVIII)

Environment

Critical health effect

Sound level dB(A)*

Time hours

Outdoor living areas

Annoyance

50 – 55

16

Indoor dwellings

Speech intelligibility

35

16

Bedrooms

Sleep disturbance

30

8

School classrooms

Disturbance of communication

35

During class

Industrial, commercial and traffic areas

Hearing impairment

70

24

Music through earphones

Hearing impairment

85

1

Ceremonies and entertainment

Hearing impairment

100

4

*The ear has different sensitivities to different frequencies, being least sensitive to extremely high and extremely low frequencies. (ref. [WHO] Fundamentals of Acoustics p. 19) Because of this varied sensitivity, the term “A weighting” is used: all the different frequencies, that make up the sound, are assessed to give a sound pressure level. The sound pressure level measured in dB is referred to as “A-weighted” and expressed as dB(A). (ref. [WHO] Guidelines p.IX and X).

The [WHO] guidelines also offer recommendations to governments for implementation, such as extending (and enforcing) existing legislation and including community noise in environmental impact assessments. The role of WHO is to provide leadership and technical support.

… studies … have suggested that noise levels of 50 dB(A) at night may also increase the risk of myocardial infarction by chronically elevating cortisol production.

Fairly typical roadway noise levels are sufficient to constrict arterial blood flow and lead to elevated blood pressure; in this case, it appears that a certain fraction of the population is more susceptible to vasoconstriction. This may result because annoyance from the sound causes elevated adrenaline levels [which] trigger a narrowing of the blood vessels (vasoconstriction), or independently through medical stress reactions.

Other effects of high noise levels are increased frequency of headaches, fatigue, stomach ulcers and vertigo.

According to … new figures [from the World Health Organization Noise Environmental Burden on Disease working group – 2007] long-term exposure to traffic noise may account for approximately 3% of coronary heart disease deaths (or about 210,000 deaths) in Europe each year.

To obtain the new estimates, the working group compared households with abnormally high noise exposure with those with quieter homes. They also reviewed epidemiologic data on heart disease and hypertension, and then integrated these data into maps showing European cities with different levels of environmental noise.

The noise threshold for cardiovascular problems was determined to be a chronic nighttime [sic] exposure of at least50 A-weighted decibels, the noise level of light traffic.

Daytime noise exposures also correlated with health problems, but the risk tended to increase during the nighttime [sic] hours. “Many people become habituated to noise over time,” says working group member Deepak Prasher, a professor of audiology at University College in London. “The biological effects are imperceptible, so that even as you become accustomed to the noise, adverse physiological changes are nevertheless taking place, with potentially serious consequences to human health.”

Other recent support for an association of cardiovascular mortality with noise comes from a study published in the 1 January 2007 issue of Science of the Total Environment. The results showed an 80% increased risk of cardiovascular mortality for women who judged themselves to be sensitive to noise. “Given these findings, noise sensitivity is a serious candidate to be a novel risk factor for cardiovascular mortality in women,” says Marja Heinonen-Guzejev, a research scientist at the University of Helsinki and lead author of the paper.

The broader implications of chronic noise exposure also need to be considered. “Noise pollution contributes not only to cardiovascular disease, but also to hearing loss, sleep disruption, social handicaps, diminished productivity, impaired teaching and learning, absenteeism, increased drug use, and accidents,” says physician Louis Hagler, who coauthored a review on noise pollution in the March 2007 Southern Medical Journal. “The public health repercussions of increasing noise pollution for future generations could be immense.”

There is also a potential interaction between noise and air pollution, given that individuals exposed to traffic noise, for example, are often simultaneously exposed to air pollution.

Noise can be annoying, interfere with speech, disturb sleep or interfere with work. Prolonged exposure to loud noise can also result in increased heart rate, anxiety, hearing loss and other health effects. The impacts of noise depend both on the noise level and its characteristics and how it is perceived by the person affected.

From: Technical notes to the tables – i Specified noise values refer to noise from traffic on roads, road bridges and freeways, and do not include ambient noise from other sources. However, they rely on all traffic noise at the receiver location—not only noise due to the project under consideration.

Community members are invited to attend the information session on Thursday 12 June from 6pm to 8pm at Bulahdelah Bowling Club.

“Important community issues will be discussed, such as how recent noise monitoring carried out compares against noise levels predicted before the upgrade opened to traffic,” the Roads and Maritime spokesperson said.

“An independent specialist noise consultant carried out the assessment at 10 locations along the bypass.

“The monitoring work aims to ensure noise from the new road causes as little disturbance as possible to nearby residents.

“The project team will explain the final noise report findings and answer questions on other minor work completed on the bypass.”

For catering purposes, please register for the session by calling the toll free information line 1800 688 153.

The Media Release regarding the “27 May 2014” “COMMUNITY INFORMATION SESSION” of “Thursday 12 June”, although at the RMS website, was selectively distributed within Bulahdelah with some households not being issued with same.

Extract from Nerong Newsletter, Myall Coast Nota 8-11-2007: … We look forward to being informed. [The RTA’s … tactics at Nerong CIG meetings dictated that attending citizens would be ‘informed only’ and questions would be ‘blocked’ by ‘word guidelines’ which were not made available to said meeting attendees.]

On Saturday, 18th August, 2007, residents of Nerong who attended a “Noise control” meeting with Robert (Bob) Higgins, RTA (now RMS) Manager, Pacific Highway were subjected to the following:-

told that they should have ‘recognised the possibility of increasing noise into the future’ before buying there;

‘corrected’ for expecting to ‘receive’ RTA ‘proposals’ re noise;

‘reminded’ that, as the ‘Community Interest Group’, they were to be ‘informed only’; and

had their questions ‘blocked’ by ‘word guidelines’ (which were ‘not available for perusal’). Nerong Newsletter, Myall Coast Nota 8-11-2007.

Reply from a resident to the RTA: “We wish to advise that the Noise Assessment Data sheet has readings for eight (8) consecutive days, this is quite impossible, as the meter on our roof was installed and then removed as the operator informed me that there was too much distortion noise in the meter, possibly from rain and he stated that the readings had to be discarded. The meter was later re-installed by the same operator for three days and picked up about 7.00 PM one evening, therefore, it seems now very strange that we have a Tuesday to Tuesday sequential unbroken date reading in the Noise Assessment Data sheet, a sequence that can only be possible if the sheet was filed[sic] in without the use of the noise meter readings. I supplied the operator with the ladder to install the meter so I was fully aware of his comings and goings during the noise testing”.

[Residents of another household] received a letter in October, 2002, from the Minister for Transport & Roads stating: “The Minister has been advised that noise readings undertaken at …’s house during April & May 2002 indicate that noise levels are below Environment Protection Authority Guidlines.” Which is very strange since no readings have been taken on their property despite their repeated requests to the RTA.

[Another resident] … is very badly affected by noise and “Cant have conversation on verandah without shouting!” The RTA placed noise monitoring gear on far side of house away from road AND strategically located between two plant pot, and took the recordings after a holiday period had ended. This is part of a pattern of trying to record biased measurements. They also put a dust monitoring device on the far side of the house.

[Other residents] have a story of the monitor being put out the back behind the shed.

[One of the above residents] has heard numerous anecdotes of monitors being taken away because the readings were ‘too loud’.

As a condition of the RTA doing any remediation work, the RTA has been asking residents to sign a “Consent and Agreement” form, which includes “the Releasor Releases unconditionally and forever all claims and causes of action against the RTA in respect of any need for noise amelioration works”. Some residents have found themselves forced to sign this since they haven’t had a decent night’s sleep since the highway upgrade’s opening as the alternative could be years of law-suits.

Since the opening of the Yelgun to Chinderah By-pass, we are now subjected to a 30% increase in heavy traffic (Byron Shire Echo, October 1 2002, p.3) with B-doubles day and night and their increased engine capacity and tyre noise.

—————————————————————————————————————-

Advertisements

Share this:

Like this:

One Response

As a resident on the Sapphire to Woolgoolga upgrade, having been subjected to 2+ years of horrendous noise, dust, vibration, fumes by leightons I have reached the point where we cannot live in our home anymore. the RTA, now calling themselves RMS, have done nothing to monitor Leightons contractors in any way, the EPA refuses to act and the media refuses to publish anything negative about the horrid impacts on residents. The ministers have been made fully aware yet fail to act. leightons have been given the powers to police themselves and no other agency will take action to bring them into line.
I can say that all of the above symptoms are very true and most people exposed to these levels of noise will suffer sooner or later.